{"id":321727,"date":"2026-08-15T00:07:02","date_gmt":"2026-08-15T00:07:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/321727\/"},"modified":"2026-08-15T00:07:02","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T00:07:02","slug":"brooklyn-lawmakers-join-privacy-advocates-in-push-to-ban-the-scan-at-msg-brooklyn-paper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/321727\/","title":{"rendered":"Brooklyn lawmakers join privacy advocates in push to \u2018Ban the Scan\u2019 at MSG \u2022 Brooklyn Paper"},"content":{"rendered":"

A coalition of privacy advocates, local lawmakers and artists gathered outside Moynihan Train Hall, across from Madison Square Garden, on Aug. 14 to renew calls to end the use of biometric surveillance in places of public accommodation such as MSG. The group also urged the City Council to pass Council Member Shahana Hanif\u2019s (D-Brooklyn) Ban the Scan, Int. 213<\/a>, which would prohibit businesses open to the public from collecting or using customers\u2019 biometric information for surveillance.<\/p>\n

The organizers \u2014 Surveillance Technology Oversight Project<\/a> (S.T.O.P.), Fight for the Future, NYC DSA Tech Action, the Jim Owles Liberal Democratic Club, and musicians Cristy Road Carrera and Paisley Fields \u2014 urged immediate action as more private businesses implement biometric surveillance. They warned that sensitive information \u2014 including people\u2019s faces, names and voices \u2014 is vulnerable to misuse, could be sold to third parties such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or exposed in data breaches.<\/p>\n

In June, ShinyHunters, a hacking group, stole sensitive customer information<\/a> from MSG and threatened to leak 26 million records unless the company paid a ransom.<\/p>\n

The rally also came amid renewed scrutiny<\/a> of MSG\u2019s use of facial recognition technology, including the venue\u2019s alleged compilation of files tracking activists who openly protested its use of the technology. Civil rights groups and lawmakers have long alleged that MSG owner James Dolan is flagrantly abusing facial recognition technology<\/a>, violating visitors\u2019 privacy and banning critics.<\/p>\n

\"\"City Council Member Shahana Hanif\u2019s \u201cBan the Scan\u201d bill would prohibit businesses open to the public from collecting or using customers\u2019 biometric information for surveillance.Photo by Gabriele Holtermann<\/p>\n

Hanif said momentum was on the side of privacy advocates, noting that Samuel A.A. Levine, commissioner of the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, and 27 council members, including members of the Council\u2019s Progressive Caucus, support Intro 213.<\/p>\n

\u201cMadison Square Garden has shown us exactly what happens when corporations are allowed to deploy facial recognition without meaningful limits: they use it to track, profile, and blacklist people they don\u2019t like,\u201d Hanif said. \u201cYour face should not be a tool that a corporation can use to punish you for exercising your rights. We have the opportunity to stop this abuse in New York City. It is time for the Council to pass Ban the Scan.\u201d<\/p>\n

S.T.O.P., a Brooklyn-based civil rights nonprofit, has been fighting discriminatory surveillance and working to protect the privacy and civil rights of New Yorkers since 2019. Its executive director, Michell Dahl, said the dangers of facial recognition and other AI-driven surveillance tools extended far beyond MSG. Venues and businesses such as Citi Field and Wegmans also use facial recognition and other AI-driven surveillance tools, she said.<\/p>\n

Currently, New York City businesses are only required to post a notice informing customers that they are collecting biometric data; they are not required to obtain customers\u2019 permission.\n<\/p>\n

\u201cThe data collected by these systems is different. It is highly sensitive data. You can change your password. You can get a new credit card, but you cannot change your face if that data is hacked,\u201d Dahl said. \u201cWe don\u2019t know how this data may be retained or shared, including with immigration or law enforcement, which poses an alarming threat to immigrant New Yorkers and Black and Brown community members across the city.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Protesters call for an end to biometric surveillance at businesses open to the public during an Aug. 14 rally outside Madison Square Garden.Photo by Gabriele Holtermann \"\"Protesters call for an end to biometric surveillance at businesses open to the public during an Aug. 14 rally outside Madison Square Garden.Photo by Gabriele Holtermann<\/p>\n

Raaid Arshad, a member of the NYC DSA Tech Action Working Group and a software engineer, said he was \u201cwell aware\u201d of both the positive and negative aspects of modern technology. Biometric surveillance misidentified Black and Brown people at rates up to 100 times higher than white people, according to the ACLU of Massachusetts<\/a>, and Arshad said the tools not only posed immense privacy risks but also threatened civil liberties through high error rates and the disproportionate criminalization of marginalized New Yorkers.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe should not have to give up our faces to attend a basketball game,\u201d he said. \u201cWe should not have to let our gait be analyzed just to buy a toothbrush. And we should not be locked out of our homes or unfairly evicted because facial recognition tools can\u2019t recognize our black and brown skin tones. We must \u201cBan the Scan\u201d in New York City.\u201d<\/p>\n

Evan Greer, director at Fight for the Future, was among the activists whose information was included in a trove of hacked documents<\/a>. A folder titled \u201cFacial Recognition Activist\u201d contained a three-page dossier about Greer. She warned that Dolan had assembled a \u201csurveillance empire\u201d that rivals some nation-states.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are far fewer rules governing how he can use it than how our own government can use its surveillance capabilities,\u201d Greer said. \u201cIf we continue down this path, where billionaires, corporations, and powerful individuals can leverage surveillance to protect their power and profits to escape accountability, we won\u2019t just lose our privacy; we will lose the last vestiges of democratic control in this country.\u201d<\/p>\n

Country music artist Paisley Fields said his fan base is largely queer and transgender, and that he wants his fans to feel safe and welcome when they attend his concerts. He called biometric surveillance technology an invasion of privacy that also poses a danger to the LGBTQIA+ community.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are often at risk of being targeted. As an artist who is unabashedly political in my music, this type of facial recognition technology and AI surveillance is very much in opposition to the message I\u2019m looking to put out,\u201d Fields said. \u201cThe data collected could be leaked or hacked and used to track, surveil, or target specific groups of people.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A coalition of privacy advocates, local lawmakers and artists gathered outside Moynihan Train Hall, across from Madison Square…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":321728,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[121148,121149,98,100,99,121150,121151,222,9,24,12,370,63,121152,5328,63601,121153],"class_list":["post-321727","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-ban-the-scan","tag-biometric-surveillance","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-fight-for-the-future","tag-intro-213","tag-madison-square-garden","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-news","tag-newsletter","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-dsa-tech-action","tag-shahana-hanif","tag-surveillance-technology-oversight-project-s-t-o-p","tag-the-jim-owles-liberal-democratic-club"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321727","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321727"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321727\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/321728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}